Sen's Guitar Making Blog

Making the bridge

2012-01-23T22:26:00.005+08:00

I also began making the bridge.
After assembling my assort of bridge blank, I discover all my IRW bridge blank are purplish in color.
The back is more brownish in color.
But in the end I chose a slight purplish blank, but taps well and the grain line matches the back

My assort of bridge blank

The final three candidate, which one is the chosen one? Make a guess.

I saw the blank to size and shoot the edges square.
I also measured the amount of curvature require on the underside (about 2mm) to fit the top.

Shoot a reference edge

Mark the size of the bridge

Saw to size

First I marked out the 650mm position on the top.
Then I put in the fingerboard and place a 3mm action on 12th fret (my Aluminium bar is just nice 3mm)
Placing a straight edge from nut to 650 and then measure the displacement from the top.
It's about 10.4mm for the string height.
This is a nice height: If I include 1mm for the fret crown height, it's about 11.4mm
When I lower the treble to 2.5mm the final height will be about 10.4mm
And take away 1mm taper for the bass and keeping the action at 3mm, the final height will also be 10.4mm.
It worked out just nice.

Neck Geometry
I believe not a lot of guitar making books cover this aspect of guitar making.
Basically is the dimensions of the components that will affect the geometry of the action (@ 12th fret)

There is a great discussion over at the Declamp forum on this.

The components that affect the action includes:
@ nut position
- fingerboard thickness
- nut excess height: assume same as fret crown height.
- neck angle elevation - height extra from parallel plane of reference
@ 12th fret
- action
- fingerboard thickness
- fret crown height
@ bridge
- top doming
- bridge height
- saddle excess height (protruding from bridge)
The relation of the 12 th fret is 1/2 difference between the bridge and nut height

The diagram below should help for a better picture of the geometry

Neck angle diagram

action + neck angle = 0.5 [ (string height + doming) - (fingerboard thickness - fret crown height) ]

action = 0.5 [ (string height + doming) - (fingerboard thickness + fret crown height) ] - neck angle

And when we analyse often we need to analyse the bass side and the treble side.
The bass fret board is usually 1mm lower than the treble side so the equation will shift.

This equation will help to determine the doming in the solera how much to dig into the lower bout depression. :)
My doming used is about 5mm.
Of course all these are in theory, in practical, the doming on the top may not exactly follow the depression on the solera, so the most practical is to measure like what I did, the exact string height above the doming.

Measure the string height at 650 mark

10.4mm it says

A glimpse of how it looks finally

Another view

I also prepared the caul for gluing the bridge.

Sawing the slots where the braces pass thru'

Done.

Well since while waiting for the glue to dry on the binding, I continue with the bridge making.
I chose another blank one that is more brownish instead of purplish.
After weighing the same blank I discovered that it was heavier than the previous blank.
In this case I think it is helpful to have a slightly heavier blank.
The new blank of the same size as the previous one weight about 51g the older one is about 46g.

For a start I measure the doming of the top which is about 2mm
I scrape the center part of the blank and push outwards to the wings.
Finally I sanded it on the top with a sandpaper underneath to get an exact fit.
After the doming are fitted, I routed the slot with my B&D RTX and the Stewmac precision router attachment.
The 2 Aluminium bars are clamp to act as a guide.

Then I started to shape the wings with chisels.
I saw multiple slots in the wings and remove the waste by chisel.
This is a woodworking technique I learn when making dados and will prevent big chunk of wood from chipping out.
Finally I started to shape using the rebate plane that I had :)

Measure the amount of doming to impart to the underside of the bridge.

It's about 2mm

Scrape the center part of the bridge blank.

Final sand to fit.

The bridge's doming fitted to the top

Routing the saddle slot

Another view. The 2 Aluminium bar act as a guide.

Saddle slot routed

Sawing the boundary of the tieblock region

Multiple slots are sawn to aid the chiseling and to prevent big chunks from tearing out during chiseling

Chiseling the waste

Most of the waste are removed.

Shaping with the rebate plane

Almost done. More to go to shape it nicely actually.

This bridge blank matches the fingerboard shade nicely.

More of shaping the wings and thin it to about 4mm.
Now one side is about 5.x mm the other side 4.x mm
Care must be taken to ensure the wings aren't dished the profile should smooth.
I use the following tools:
scraper, rebate plane, rasp, file.
Finally once the thickness is achieved, sandpaper.
I make sure I leave an edge of about 1mm and not over thin the edges.
For the ends, I will make a slight curve to ensure that the bridge does not stress on one particular grain line on the top.

Scraping the wings. Be careful not to scrape just a spot, it's pretty easy to dish a depression in the wings.

The bridge wings almost done.

Wing profile (bass side)

Wing profile (treble side). Can see that the profile is not symmetrical

I had some time and use the rebate plane and scraper to correct the profile shape of the wings.
Now it looked much better
But again the weight is still about 36g still a bit of weight to shave off.

The wing profile is much better now

From the other side.

After the wing profile looks correct, I began to cut the central groove.
Originally I had plan to use the RTX to route the central groove but I didn't had time to set it up.
So I just use a guiding block and saw the tie block edge and chisel the rest.
So far no mistake as yet.
I weight the bridge it was 32 g abit over my expectation.
I had anticipated it to drop by a bit after I remove wood from the central tie block region.
But the weight didn't drop too much.
I might have to thin another 1 mm from the tie block and the saddle slot block.

A guide block for the sawing.

Sawing the tie block boundary

Slot sawn.

Chisel the shape of the saddle slot block. It should slope down to facilitate string pass thru' the hole at the bottom of the tie block.

Almost done. The weight now is 32g; a bit on the high side.

More of trying means to reduce the weight and finally I manage to get it near 25.7g
Not bad.
1) Reduce the tie block weight
2) Ridge the saddle block and tie block region
3) Reduce the entire width of the bridge but more of the tie block side.
We need the saddle front block to be thick (at least 4mm thick) to withstand the forces of the string pull on saddle.
4) Reduce thickness of the wing to 4mm and possibly 3mm thick (Now is about 4mm)
I will make the saddle groove deeper (now is about 3mm) and the ridge between tie block and saddle block deeper too.
This will probably bring it down to below 25g

Carve the ridge between the saddle block and the tie block.

Reducing the thickness of the tieblock to about 9.3mm. It was about 10.5 mm

Profile of the saddle block and tie block. 99% done.
I would probably increase the depth the ridge between them.

25.9g Almost there.

Yeah after doing several things the weight of the bridge is reduce to 23.6g.
It's within target but of course it can be reduced further.
My last bridge was about 21g
What I did was:
1) Increase the groove between the tie block and saddle block by chiseling.
2) Route deeper the saddle slot.
3) Thin the wing
4) Reduce the length of the bridge to 52mm per side from tie block. It was about 57 - 58 mm or so.
5) Curved the ends so that the end doesn't sit on one grain line and cause stress to the spruce top.

Now it look good.

23.6g within target.

Curving the ends of the bridge. This ensures that the bridge doesn't stress on one grain line on the top.

Profile the saddle block and tie block. The saddle groove was deepened.

Binding and Purfling

2012-01-20T14:55:00.001+08:00

What's next?
Well I have to start on the binding and purfling.
I am doing a miter on the back and sides, so I need to glue a red and white strip to the bottom of the binding.

I choose the binding out of my stock of maple binding.
The 4 strips had about the same colour and had moderately curls
Then I use the rule and purfling cutter method to cut the strips.

My stock of maple binding

Zoom in view. Can see the moderate curl in the binding

Cutting the strips

With my self made purfling cutter. It works great!

After cutting all the pieces needed I began to glue the red and white purfling to the binding.
This will be for the side miter.

Glue purfling to the binding.

After the glue dried I scrape and plane the excess.
Looks good. Next step is to bend it accordingly

Plane and scrape the excess

The side purfling looks good

The excess waste

Glue 2 more left with 1 more to be glued.

Well I didn't manage to do much just shave the excess off the other 2.
My MJF rebate plane worked the best: light and handy compared to the Stanley block.

3 done one more to go.

Tuning the box

2012-01-13T15:27:00.002+08:00

I recorded some tap tone and analyse the frequency.
The top resonance is a high B3 253Hz and body resonance B2 123Hz
It's higher than I had hope for, Now I might just shoot for a heavier bridge to bring down the resonance or thin the perimeter to bring down the resonance.

Body resonance @ 123 Hz B2

Top resonance @ 253 Hz B3

I began to sand the top to bring down the resonance mainly on the lower bout perimeter.
After some vigorous sanding, I manage to bring down a few Hz; still have a long way to go.

Sanding the top.

Body resonance after sanding

Top resonance after sanding

After somemore sanding the resonance points didn't change too much and I realise I can't sand anymore.
The edges are too thin about slightly over 1 mm.
Now what I can do is to reach in and shave down the braces but before that I need to consider what other actions to take.
I could try to shave the back braces to increase the back coupling.
The body resonance should be within range but top resonance is a bit too high.
Anyway I think I just do up the binding and glue in the bridge.
If need to I adjust the back bracing to add more coupling.

Body resonance @ 106Hz G#2

Top Resonance @ 247Hz B3

Top Resonance @ 214 Hz G#3

Closing the box

2012-01-05T08:52:00.009+08:00

Well before I can close the box, I need to figure out how...
My solera doesn't have slots so I can't insert my F-clamp to clamp the back like what I did for the last round.
Only my big F-clamp (which I only have 4 of them) can reach in just far enough to clamp.
I will use those for the tail block and heel.
For the rest, I still are unable to figure out how to clamp.

One of the way is to use strings.
So I tried a dry run to see how long I need.
I clamp the solera to the bench top.
Note that the solera is very heavy so I clamp onto it length wise the weight of the bench top won't topple in this way.
After that I proceed to use the string to clamp.
It took about 15 mins and that's way too long.
So I think I won't be using strings...
Any good way?

I did note that once the 2 big clamps are applied to the heel and end block area, the rest of them doesn't really need much clamping down.
So the go-bars might just do the trick.
I'll try that next...

Strings to clamp the back. The wedge is to increase the string tension

Solera clamped to the bench top.

Before I close the box I tap the back and compare to the sound clips which I have tapped and recorded before I added those radial braces.
As expected the pitch is much higher than the previous tap tone where there is only the traverse brace.
So I decided to lower a bit more.
What I am looking for is a deep bass growl.
The previous tap just sound a bit too high in pitch.

Radial brace profile.
Lower towards the external edges

Overall profile

After trying various ways... the easiest is to use go-bars :)
Initially I thought go-bars doesn't have the strength to clamp down properly.
But I was wrong.
If one bar is not enough then simply add another.
The seam between the back and the rims are tight.
Think I can start closing the back all preparation are set.
Stay tune. (I took a pic but it was blurred so no pics to show the dry run process)

Well now is the real thing.
As I need to work fast I get everything prepared.
All the go-bar by the side within reach; the back marked to help with the alignment; the wooden block within reach; HHG all heat up ready to glue.
Before gluing I heat up the gluing area.
Then with quick hand I apply the HHG, and it started to gel already by the time I finished applying thru' out the rim.
I use the hairdryer to heat up further before gluing the back.
After a quick alignment, I began to put in the go-bars.
Luckily with the dry run, I realised I had to start from the inner side (though it's common sense, it's easily forgotten w/o dry run practice) to facilitate fast application of the go-bar.
After some adjustment I am all set all within 2 or 3 minutes or so.
Much faster than using strings.

Ready for closing the box.

Heat up the gluing surface

After applying the glue, heat up the HHG before closing the box.

Applying the go-bar to clamp down the back.

Can see the upper deck of the go-bar deck.
It was adjusted up to cater for the taller back.

Closeup view

Well after 1 day's of gluing, I excited removed the go-bars and examine the result.
So far ok though it's not really perfect.
There are some gaps in the closing but none too big.
I trim off the excess edges using my favourite rebate plane and chisel at the waist.
Next to come is binding and purfling but that's another big headache.

Removing the go-bar

Close up view

At the waist

Lower bout

Trim off the excess edges

Can see the doming of the back

The back

Side profile

Fingerboard

2011-12-28T09:31:00.005+08:00

Well I am supposed to close the box but it was raining very heavily these few days.
The RH shot up to 80%+
This made it very unsuitable for closing.
So what I did was to start on the fingerboard.
I just scrape the surface smooth; the fingerboard that comes from LMI was pretty well surfaced.
I just need to shoot to square the reference side.
I had some someother ebony that definitely need more work to get it smooth.
Anyway the maximum thickness of the fingerboards are about 8mm only
I remembered wrongly and thought they were at least 10 mm thick.
This threw my calculation off for the neck geometry
I had to rework the geometry readings to get the correct action at 12th fret

Shoot and straighten a reference edge.
The slots will be saw square to this edge.

I made a mistake during the sawing of the fret slots.
I used the LMI 650mm scale length template and saw using the LMI jig.
By right it's dummy proof but well I managed to goof it up...

I saw according to instructions:
Using the 650mm side of the template slots, I double tape the fret board to the template.
Then I adjust the depth of the cut using the nut slot as a reference check.
After making sure everything is OK I started sawing.

For the 1st 2 slots I can see the slot marking on the template, but after that it's all covered by the fingerboard.
I had to slide the template and feel the pin slide into the slot.
That's why I made the goof up.
During the 11th fret slot sawing, I mistakely thought the pin was inserted into the slot.
(How could I have missed that!!!)
And what's worse I made the mistake twice.
As a result I cut 2 fret slot one before one after 11th fret.
And I didn't saw the 11th fret..

I didn't realise that initially.
When I took out to check how many slot I have done, I thought the slots looked very funny.
After inserting back into the jig then I realised I missed the 11th slot and cut one before and one after...
Anyway I continue the rest of the sawing and use PVA mixed with ebony dust to fill the slot.
But I think it will still be very visible.
I have to wait till it dries and sand it smooth to find out.

Preparing to saw the slot

Sawing the slot

The goof-up... patched with white PVA mixed with ebony dust. Some update after I sanded down the excess the fill up looks quite good. Certainly not invisible but quite ok. With a black fingerboard dye I guess it would look ok afterall. Thank goodness.

The patch after some sanding.

View from far cant really tell the patch mark.

Closeup shot can see rather clearly. The center still some more filling

The treble side.

After 2nd filling looks good as new. After the patch filling, I began to cut to shape the fingerboard. I roughly draw the center line and measure 26 from the center line for the but region (52 mm for the nut width) And at the 12th fret region I measure 31mm each side (62mm at 12th fret). After marking out I saw away some of the excess and remove the rest using a shooting board and plane. Ebony is really pain to plane...

At the nut, 52 mm

At 12th fret 62 mm.

Saw away some excess

Shoot the rest to the line

Fingerboard done

The amount of waste generated

How the fingerboard look on the neck

Close up view to align the center line.
So far so good.
Then I turn over and plane the back of the fingerboard.
The bass side should be about 1mm lower than the treble side.
This is because bass string tend to vibrate more than the treble string.
Alternative I can plane the top of the fingerboard but as Ebony is prone to tear-out, there might be blemishes...
So it's better to plane the under side so that even with some blemishes it's not visible.
I smoothen it with scraper and scraper works really well with ebony but the heat build up on the scraper is really hot to the touch almost like frying pan.
Think it might be good to make a scraper holder like the LV version.

Planing the underside of the ebony fingerboard

Before I close the box, I need to cut the fingerboard and the elevated part of the neck to shape.
As the sides are attached, there is no way a coping saw can be inserted.
So I just use a junior hacksaw to saw straight lines and chisel away the excess.
I had a small chip on the front face of the neck but luckily not too deep.
After that I use my chisel and file to shape.

Saw straight cuts on the excess part

Chisel away the waste parts

Chisel to match the sound hole

File to shape

Saw the corresponding shape on the fingerboard.

After shaping the fingerboard, I realise the neck part underneath the finger is not long enough to cover the 20th fret...
So I just saw away the neck below the 20th fret to match the sound hole.

The neck to follow the shape of the sound hole.

The fingerboard shape with the 20th fret.

The neck after smoothened with a roller sander.

From the bout looking up to the neck, looks decent even though the neck didn't extend to the 20th fret fingerboard part.

Close up frontal view.

Glue the back reinforcement

2011-12-15T14:17:00.002+08:00

After the inlay what comes next is the gluing the back reinforcement strip.
This cross-grain patch of Spanish Cedar (stable wood) will help to reinforce the back seam
which after the inlay is only at 1mm thick.

No much tricks here just cut to size and glue.
I know some do profile the back strip but I don't as I think the taper at the edge is already very nice.

The only problem is how to clamp the strip
Well I use HHG so it grabs pretty quickly, I just hold until it grabs.
I weight it down with my planes.

The last part I use some clamp to clamp it.
Underneath the seam I support it with my radius stick
Though the back is not exactly fits the stick radius but it's better than having none at all.

Reinforcement strips cut to size.

Measure the thickness of the tail block

Transfer to the strip. But I did leave a bit of allowance for final fitting.

Glue and hold down the strip until it grabs

Final clamping setup.
Not the best but it will do just OK.

The gluing came out fine
I scrape the back and all the tear-out were removed except one which was abit too deep
But more scraping will level it.
Before I close the back I will record the tap tone once more

After gluing. All is well.

Scraping the back

Tear-out almost gone.

Remove part of the reinforcement for fitting the end block.

I saw 4 braces for the back, profile them, and glue them to the black
After tap tuning the back, and shaving down the braces a bit I clamp the lower bout rim to the body and tap the tone.
It sounded quite nice with a nice deep bass.

After sawing the braces, lay them out to see the correct length.
The ends are scalloped.

Profile the braces.

Start to clamp

Clamping done.

Back done with my label pasted.

The back ready to be closed

Tap tune the back. Only the lower bout is active so I clamp it up and tap to hear the tone.

Inlay the back strip

2011-12-09T10:36:00.008+08:00

Well I posted on the OLF and had different opinion on whether to inlay the back strip or not.
For a thing, I like both looks.
The back without the back strip looks nice and the look with the back strip fits the big rosette.
So I go ahead and do the back strip

The back strip consist of 3 alternating tiles same as the rosette: IRW, Bloodwood and Basswood.
I was choosing the router bit for the routing.
And decide on the widest one which is about 12.5mm
Minus the 2.x mm for the thickness of the purfling red / white, it's about 10mm wide tiles.
I use my purfling cutter to cut the correct width saw to size using my miter box.
I cut the red and white fiber using the purfling cutter too with a 1m rule as a guide.
To assemble I use my 2 Aluminium bar to glue the purlfing 1st.
Then I glue the tiles to the 1st purfling and sandwich the other side with the purfling.
I use white PVA as it dries clear and has longer open time.
Anyway I was lazy to heat up the hide glue.

After it dried, I check the looks with the back, with or without.

Checking the looks of the back strip

Assemble the tiles check for the correct width on all tiles and adjust with a plane

Cutting the fiber purfling

Glue the white fiber to the red.

Glued

Clamped.

With back strip

Without back strip which looks better?

When I decide to go ahead, I began the routing setup.
I supported the center back joint part and the sides of back.
They are of different height due to the curavture of the back struts.
But with different scrap they are well supported.
I clamp 2 Aluminium bar to the back to act as a guide.
After adjusting the guide until the router base is at the center of the back along the entire length, I clamp the guide tight and check the alignment again.
Previously I had routed a channel to test fit the router bit and tiles
Then I set the depth using that previously routed channel it's about 1.5mm deep.
The back is about 2.5 so I got some meat left in the back.

After all is set I route it and all goes well.
I glue in the back strip and left it to set.

The 2 Al bar router guide.
Well you guess it correctly it's the same bar I use for clamping the back strip.

Adjusting the bar to make sure it's correctly align using eyeball only :)

Set the depth using the previously routed test channel.

Close up of the depth setting; its about 1.5mm deep channel.

Ready to route

Channels routed; everything went well.

Apply glue in the channel

Glue the back strip into the channel

Clamp tight

After removing the clamp, well... the inlay wasn't perfect.
There are some gaps but I think I can fill it up with IRW dust.
After that I simple plane down the back strip to level but in the process I cause some tearout in the back
Hopefully I can sand it level.

After removing the clamp.

Planing it flush with the back surface

The shavings

Side view can see that it's pretty leveled

Tearout

Gaps...

Making the side port

2011-12-08T01:22:00.002+08:00

Well before I close the box, I have to saw the side port.
The side port is a hole located on the side to have a monitor to the player.
It certainly works very well and the player can easily hear what he / she is playing.
But it does affect the sound by raising the box resonance.
To compensate the side port has to be located as close to the main sound hole and main sound hole has to be reduced in size.
To be effective as a sound monitor, I only create the sound port at the upper bout curve area.
In the classical playing position, that will point directly to the player.

To reinforce the sound port I added a layer of 3mm spruce to the behind of the sides.
3mm of spruce is definitely hard to bend.
In my 1st guitar I use Basswood for the backing and at 2mm it's definitely easier to bend
Well this time round I found a soundboard cutoff of the right size and decided to use it...
It goes well in the end though.

For the bend I used 2 wooden block to help bend especially at the edges where it's hard to apply the force to the small piece.
These wooden block I got from Daiso and they are very very very useful.
I have used them for many occasions.

Checking the size

Start bending (with 2 hands of course)

Another view.

More of less bent.

Glued

Now to cut the port.
I lost the previous template which I did for my #1 so I had to redraw it.
It didn't take long and I trace the shape onto the upper bout.
I use the fosterner bit to drill the hole and saw the rest.

Traced the shape onto the sides

Drill 2 small holes

Use the forstner bit to drill the larger hole.

One side drilled

Using coping saw to saw to the other hole

Both sawn

Filing the edges smooth

A look on the inside, the spruce did split from the drilling...

Carve some bevel on the edges to make it look better.
Well I managed to cut into my index finger tip when i carve it...

Gluing the back struts

2011-12-06T09:52:00.001+08:00

Well after scraping the back, I began to glue the back struts.
Before that I had the final check on the curvature of the entire back on the body frame.
Well since the slots are already cut into the lining, I have to fit them correctly to the back.
I marked on the sides where the slots are and transfer the marking to the back.
But to better fit, I glue in the center brace and adjust the marking for the other brace.
Glue in the LB back brace and check the marking for the UB brace and adjust accordingly.
Also I check the center line marking making sure it's in line.

After I glued in the center back brace I discover a mistake...
Guess what?
I forgotten to inlay the back strip!!!
Argh, it's definitely doable now but much easier if the back if flat...
Now I have to test my creativity again on how to solve the problem.

Check the position of the struts

Glued the center back brace

Glue the LB back brace

Glue the UB back brace

Another view with the body :) Almost ready for closing the box

Checking the fit.
The back is displaced slightly to the rear but not too bad fit as there are allowance.
The waist region some parts are jagged, but its OK as those area will be covered by the binding.

The profile of the back struts

Thicknessing the back

2011-12-01T10:00:00.001+08:00

While waiting for the lining to dry, I thickness the back to about 2.5mm
No frill just plain hard work...
I worked on the lower bout 1st before going for the upper bout.
While I thickness I tapped to hear the sound.
I will record the tap tone for future reference.
After planing it, I scrape it smooth

Lower bout

Upper bout

After planing I have to scrape it.
Well I can't get my scraper to be very sharp using the usual way of creating the burr and turn it.
I simply file the edges and created the burr from there.
Well not orthodox but it works.
I also plane away the excess portion by a bit to better fit the plantilla of the body.

Scraping the back

Shaping the back to fit more nicely with the body shape

SG Guitar show 2011

2011-11-29T16:30:00.000+08:00

There is a Singapore Guitar Show 2011 (2nd) at the Suntec Exhibition Center this weekend, 3rd Dec to 4th Dec.
Do drop by if you are free.
More info at this site.

Singapore Guitar Show 2011

Back struts

2011-11-25T11:12:00.003+08:00

I saw started preparing the back struts.
Till now I am still thinking to make a live back or inactive back.
Check out Trevor Gore's book it says a lot about live back (active back).
It's said to give a better tone but at a certain expense of the volume.

Anyway I cut the brace blank from spruce and profile it accordingly

All 3 struts ready for shaping

Shooting the curve into the 1st brace.

The curve is nicely fitted with the foot.

Shooting the curve into the back struts (Lower Bout strut)

Same (Waist strut)

When I tried to shoot the struts I slipped and my thumb go crashing into the struts end...
Of course I bled but at least not on the struts....
Well that's the minor accident that always happened.
Anyway I finished shaping the curve of the back struts I tried fitting to the back and check all the fitting.
I think the foot area will need some adjustment
The rest of the struts and curvature are alright.

Some gaps in the foot region.

The curves looks OK now.

After fitting the curves, I began to work on the struts.
I saw them to size and chisel the ends to 5mm.
The ends will fit in the notches in the reverse kerfed lining.
The height of the lining is about 10mm so I chose 1/2 of it 5mm to be the final height of the brace ends.

Chiseling the curve at the ends.

Marking the position of the 1st struts

Sawing the notch pocket

Chisel away the waste

1st back brace fitted.

Then I worked on the other 2 back strut as per 1st one.
For the position of the 1st 2 back string (UB and W) I make them follow the position of the
UTB and LTB.
They are almost on top of them.
For the 3rd back strut, I just place in the center between the end block and the waist back strut.
This 3rd one is special as I will relief the center portion too.
This will make an active back which would give the guitar a bigger sound.
In addition some more struts will radiate from the center of the 3rd LB strut.

2nd back braces fitted.

I relieved the centre portion of the LB back strut for an active back.

3rd back brace fitted

Done.

Another view

Side struts

2011-11-25T10:31:00.004+08:00

I also glue the side struts to enhances the rigidity of the sides.
I have 5 on each side, 2 of them is there to support the UTB and LTB, and 3 more for the lower bout.
Well it's a bit overkill but after gluing the sides feels rigid.

Gluing the UTB and LTB support

HHG dried pretty fast so after sometime I didn't have to clamp the main body of the strut

Notching the kerfed lining of the top.

The side struts will sit into the notched lining.

Chamfer the ends of the struts

Rounding off with 1/2 round file.

All glued, looking good.

All the side struts done

When I was doing the notches in the reversed kerfed lining for the back, I made a terrible mistake.
I use the vanguard sheet to mark the position of the side struts
But I made a mistake the vanguard is outside the sides..
Due to the side curvature when transfer the markings to the linear lining, there is a position misplacement.
The notches are further apart...
Argh.. when fitted the lining only then I realise it... now I have wasted a good piece of lining material...

Marking the position of the side struts. This is a mistake, the vanguard sheet should be inside not outside of the sides.
The curvature will cause enough discrepancy when notching..

Chiseling the notches

Test fitting... the notches doesn't fit....
Now gotta think what to do...

I discard that lining as there were too many notches in there.
But it didn't go wasted, I use is as reference for the notching correctly the next lining.
I used it for both sides and managed to get it done accurately.
The vanguard sheet on the inner circle also didn't work properly as there as some thickness in the side struts (2.5mm) which is enough to make the discrepancy.
This was why I used the 1st trial lining for reference.
It is able to go over the side struts and thus be able to mark the position accurately.

I use the vanguard sheet to mark the position but this wasn't accurate either due to the thickness of the side struts.

Lining notched correctly and made wet and clamped to place.

The shape is form ready gluing.

Lining glued.
Have to worked fast as HHG gels pretty fast.
I used my hairdryer to heat it up a little.
When gluing I leave the lining abit proud of the sides to be shave away later and cater for the arc in the back.
The back is not perpendicular to the sides at the edges

The lower bout done.

Waist region

Upper bout

Glue the other side

Done.

Assembly

2011-11-16T00:17:00.006+08:00

It has been raining for the past few days.
So I was waiting for the rain to stop before I start the assembly process.
Although I had a dehumidifier, I didn't want it to overwork.
The RH went all the way into the 80s during the rainy season

So I began to assemble when it didn't rain too much today.
I drive the RH down to 60s 50s before I started gluing.

Before I glue the sides to the end block, I scrape the sides.
Though it's not perfect, but the surface was much better than before.
Then I heat up the hide glue began to glue the side to the end block.
I forgot the HHG will squeeze out of the gap so I last minute inserted a wax paper in between.

Scrape the sides inner surface

Preparing to glue the end block

Glue up

Then before I work on the top to the neck, I carve the heel almost to finish.
I thought it would be hard to do the carving when it's all assembled.
The carving was quite done quickly and it feel just right in my LH.
I didn't smooth out alot just some rough smoothen by the rasp and file.
The touch up will be done once the top is assembled.

Heel carved

Then I inserted the wedge noted mentally how to glue up the top to the neck.
The wedge will be used to clamp the top to the neck but the wedge will not be glued as yet.
As a result I had to insert a wax paper to prevent the wedge from being glued.

Checking the alignment

Heating up the parts

Glue up

Checking the alignment

Wait for the glue to set

Well after some thoughts about it I started the actual assembly.
1st I glued the wedge in between the heel block and the top.
I thought this will make the whole thing more stable so gluing in is a better option.

Next I level the end block to make sure the surface is flat.
And apply glue to the end block and glue to the top.
But problem is I don't really have a good clamping option.
I held it down by hand 1st waiting for the glue to set.
Then I clamp a wooden block to the end block and clamp the wooden block to the side mould ends.
But since the pressure is applied only at 1 side, this might distort the start.
In the end I clamp 2 blocks to the end block and use my #4 Stanley as a weight to hold it in place.
This works much better.

Next I glue in the side wedges.
Now for this I just apply glue to the rear side of the wedge
The front wedge I didn't apply any glue.
This is to allow the side to expand contract
Romanillos did it this way too.

Following that, I did up 2 sticks to held down the sides before I glue in the linings.
The sticks have 2 slots to hold the sides to a the correct width.
This are held by 4 clamps.

Lastly I start gluing the lining.
I held by hand 1st then clamp some wooden block to the sides (not side mould).
Clamps to the side mould will distort the shape.
For the lower bout since the sides is perpendicular to the top there is no issue.
For the upper bout, it is tapered, so the lining bottom at the front edge will need to be taper as well.
I use the upper block cutoff of the solera to shoot plane the correct angle to the lining bottom.
Now my favourite plane is the shoulder rebate plane.
It's light and cuts very well.
For the oblique part I just change the angle abit.
I did the lining in sections of 3 blocks to facilitate this.
Finally after some work it was done :)

The tops and neck glued nicely.

Trimming the ends of the traverse brace

Make sure there is a gap between the ends of the traverse brace and the sides
This is to ensure if the traverse brace expands it will not push against the sides.

Checking the gap for the other ends.

Trimming the frontal edge of the sides where it's going into the slot.
Once in the slot it will be very hard to trim down.

Glue in the top wedge

Note the gap in the front part.
Ensure the front wedge doesn't extend to block the side wedge.

Glue in the end block

At first I clamped it using 2 clamps to a wooden block and the side mould.
(The side mould is lifted from the solera, there is a gap of about 1.5 cm same height as the elevated neck part)

But I was afraid that this will distort the end block's vertical geometry.
So I end up just held down by weights.
I clamp 2 wooden block for more surface area.

Side wedges in. Glue is applied to the rear side (heel block side).
This is to allow the sides to move if it expands.
(But it's actually clamp very tight by the wedges I wonder if it can move or not)
Anyway Romanillos did it this way too.

Top view.

Glue in the lining. I held it down by hand until the HHG sets

Next I clamp in some wooden blocks to hold it down.
Make sure only clamp to the sides not the side mould so that it won't distort the side shape.
The lining is tapered so by clamping down this face, both vertical and horizontal force will be applied clamping to the top and sides simultaneously

Lower bout done

Shooting the correct angle for the upper bout lining (the part just beside the heel.
The angle block is the removable section of the upper bout elevated part of the solera,
so it have the correct angle.
The lining fits nicely.
The curvature part after that I just use some scraper to change the angle gradually.
The perpendicular sides after that is ok as it will be square to the side too.

Last part of the gluing

Can see the 2 sticks holding down the sides.

Close up of the lining. Looks good.
Clean up is always a problem for me... HHG is so sticky... but that's the good thing about HHG isn't it?

My workbench full of the lining shave off, and HHG droplets...

After all the glue dried, I took it out and trim the edges.
As I didn't force the sides to conform to the mould exactly, there are some edges.
I easily parred it down with my favourite rebate plane and chisel.

Here are some pics

Removing all the clamps

Lower bout lining looks good

The other side

Waist region

Upper bout

Upper bout. This pic looks a lot like my first guitar :)

Heel area

The entire inner of the guitar looks good to me :)

Some pics of the elevated neck region

From the top

From the side

Notice how this side grain line follow the curvature of the dropped top?
Looks like the side is made just for this design.

I saw away the protruding part of the end block and side wedges.
After that I use my rebate plane to shape the profile of the back.
Although I drew the 15' radius of my Gutmeier (which was probably shaped using a radius dish),
I did not really follow that profile.
I choose a high lower bout end and taper toward the upper bout just like my 1st build.
The end is a bit higher than the mark shape.
The Spanish foot was also shaped according to the radius stick which I have made previously.

I noticed there is a seam at the front side at the heel region ... I wonder how to solve it.
Also I prepared the side struts to reinforce the sides.

Cut the end block protruding part.

Plane it smooth

Done

Saw the wedges end

Sawn. I didn't take pics of how I plane the Spanish foot part basically I use chisel and my rebate plane

Shaping the side profile

Using the sticks to see if the 2 sides are of the same height.
This is a very common method in woodworking to see if a twist has occurred

Check the fit of the foot with the radius stick I made earlier

Check the side height make sure it coincide with the foot shape.
The curve of the back brace should match the foot exactly.

The foot.
The hard part is the wedge is end grain (different grain orientation with the foot).
When planing it I use chisel 1st followed by plane

All the debris collected inside the top.

The side struts prepared.

I sand the sides to make sure they fit.
I use the same method as I did for #1
A sanding board with sand paper attached.
The upper bout and lower bout will form 2 angles.

Sanding board

With sand paper clipped to it

Sanding the rims

Preparing for assembly

2011-11-02T10:24:00.004+08:00

Before assembly I need to cut the top to shape especially at the 12th fret part where it is attached to the neck.
I simply saw at the line.
After that I trim the top to conform to the side profile.

Also I cut the side to fit in the heel block.
At first I nearly mark the wrong direction.
But when I put into the solera, I discover the triangular shape orientation is wrong.
It really pays to be careful.

Normally the angle is measure from the bottom of the heel block
But in this case the heel block is blocked by the elevated neck extension.
So I had to measure from the top and hence the orientation error.
The right way up is the wider at nearer to the top and narrowed into the heel / back region.

Align the block to aid the sawing.

Ready to be sawn

Done. You can see 2 marking; outer one is where the sides' boundary.

This is where I marked wrongly. I only realised it when I put the side back into the solera
and notice the shape orientation of the triangle is wrong.

Using the marking gauge to get the angle. The additional block is to make sure the reference edge is constant.

Mark on the sides.
The distance reference from edge by measuring the center width of the heel block and divide by 2. The width is 28mm and 1/2 of it is 14mm measure from the center.
The angle will touch the marked point.

Ready to saw the sides

Sides sawn

Fitted into the solera
The triangle shape orientation is correct.

Assembly fitting

The sides orientation is correct

The wedge in action. Need to cut a more fitting wedge though.

Checking the fit of the wedge. The actual wedge will be at full width

Test fitting without the solera.

Following that, I begin to make the actual wedge for the side slots into the heel.
I cut 2 pieces and then plane to fit.
Also I began to plane the end block.
I saw the end block blank into 2 halves and plane the thinner one.
My end block ended up about 10mm thick.
I am thinking it might not be sturdy enough.
Again I was checking the curve with the mould when I plane.

Checking fit for the right wedge.

Planing the wedge.
The wood is just as scrap but it works well for a plane stopper like a bench dog

Planing the wedge.

Checking the fit on the left side

Check the fit of both sides.

Wedge for the top.

Dry assembly. Both wedges and the top wedge all working fine and well fitted.

Dry assembly to see how the elevated fretboard looks.

Dry assembly

From the side view.

In the mould with the neck and wedges in place.
Some asymmetry there.

Another view.

Well I must start to think of the sequence of assembly.
With the elevated neck in place the assembly is slight tricky.
I must also decide whether to glue in the wedges or not or simply wedge in will do.
From what I knew, Romanillos only glue the other side of the wedge and not the wedge face that is in contact with the movable piece.

Making neck

2011-10-27T10:12:00.004+08:00

Well next step is to finish up the neck, but my forstner bit hasn't arrive so I can drill out the slot hole.
I bought a cheap set from Ebay but the bit was blunt and doesn't cut at all.
That's really you get what you pay for.

Anyway at least what I can do is to drill the tuner holes since I have the jigs ready.
I first plane the slope of the head which I have marked out earlier.
I use my rabbet plane and chisel to get to the final mark and check for squareness of the edges.
After that I mark the center of the head stock and the center line for the tuner jig.
I insert a 2mm plywood to offset from the face of the headstock and align the center line of the tuner hole jig to the marked center line.
Clamped everything together and use a tape to mark the depth of the drill

I started drilling but encounter a problem, one of the tuner jig hole doesn't go thru...
My brad point drill bit which I got from LV broke at one of the side tips...
Argh... I had thought a reputable LMI would do a quality check before the ship.
But anyway I had to improvise and drill 2 holes and then flip over to drill the 3rd hole.
I finished up the tuner hole drill and now to wait for 5/8" bit to arrived.

Saw a slot to enable planing of the slope.

Chisel the waste area away. Now to start planing

Planing using rabbet plane

Both sides done. Center line marked

Tuner depth

Mark the drill bit depth

Drilling the hole

Tuner hole drilled

Both sides checked for ease of turning of the tuner.

What's next but to drill the slots and my Freud forstner bit arrived just in time and it's sharp.
Well I marked out the slots and drill the end holes.
After that I thought of drill more holes in between but in the end I decide to use coping saw to saw the in between waste.
Finally I parred the edges to the line and sand it smooth.

My Freud 5/8" drill bit

Center punching the holes to be drilled

Start drilling

Drilling in progress

Drilled.

Saw the center waste using coping saw

Done sawing

Parring the waste to the line

Sand it smooth

Done

With the tuner machine

Next I proceed to carve the string clearance slope at the slot near the nut.
This is to allow the string to go down to the tuner barrel, without touching the guitar head or at least allow it to go smoothly and not across a corner edge.
I first saw the slot and then chisel the waste.
It's just that straight forward.

Sawing the slot

Another view

All slots sawn

Start to chisel the slope

Done.

Slots done with the tuner in place.

Next I began to rough shape the heel area.
First I tried to saw with a coping saw... it's damn difficult due to the width of the neck.
Well I cut some some vertical slots in the heel to allow intermediate breaks for the coping sawing.
For the straight part I use the ryoba to do the job.
After that I use my rotary sander to shape the heel.
Now it's ready to be attached to the neck.

Cutting the curve using a coping saw.

Straight part using ryoba

All cut

Shape using sander

Check the shape on the neck.

Cut the side profile using my douzuki

The other side

Both side done.

Heel block done ready to be glue.
The detail carving will be done after assembly.

I did further shaping of the neck, the curve at the joint of the head and neck.
I use coping saw and cut then shape by the sander.

Cutting the curve

Shape with sander

Cutting the other side. The coping saw direction need to be flipped to the other side.

Shape with sander

The end product.

The heel area also narrowed

Smoothen the shape of the slots to correct some asymmetry.

As the concluding saga of the neck making before assembly, I glue up the heel block and carve the head.
Well after assembly, I still need to carve the heel and neck body profile.
I use HHG for the heel block and align properly with the markings I made.
As the block slips I basically held in place with hand until the glue grabs before I clamp in.

For shaping the head, I use chisel and my rabbet plane.
The rabbet plane works amazing well; partly because I am still not very skillful with my chiseling.
Of course I cut using saw before chiseling the waste to the line and smooth with the rabbet.

Before gluing

After gluing applying the clamps

Making sure the center line is aligned properly

Sawing the excess head

Cut roughly to the line

Saw the side notch using a block as a guide

Side notches done

Roughly sawn to shape

Chiseling to shape

Using rabbet plane to shape it. It works very well.

Done! Looks nice
And now to assembly...

Well I supposed to leave the carving of the heel to after assembly but I just couldn't help it.
I rough carved it anwyay.

Carving the secondary face.

Widening the face

Taking shape now.

The other side done.
The actual shaping will be done after assembly.

My zoot collection

2011-10-25T10:35:00.000+08:00

Well I take the opportunity to photo some of my wood collection.

Padauk

Cypress

Maple (Flamed)

Bloodwood

Bubinga

Indian Rosewood

Maple (Quilted)

Madagascar Rosewood

Cutting the harmonic bar's protuding ends

2011-10-19T17:29:00.001+08:00

Well to fit the sides to top, the protruding ends of the harmonic bar must be trimmed.
So I did just that.
First I mark the amount to be cut, and saw away as much as possible
The end section I use chisel to clean up.

Marking the section to be removed on the UTB

Marking the section to be removed on the LTB

Sawing away the protrusion.

Clean up with chisel. The chisel is sharp; see the mirror reflection?

Done. Side fitted nicely.

Check the lining if it aligns properly with the sides and top at the lower bout area.

Similarly at the upper bout area. Since the geometry is a bit different for this area.

Side supports for the harmonic bar.

Trim the heel block

2011-10-17T15:03:00.001+08:00

After the sides are trimmed, I trim the neck / heel block such that the height fits the sides which is about 80mm.
If the neck block is too high, the slipper foot will be too thin when I trim to fit.
Thus I had to plane away some of the heel block at the part which will glued to the neck.
Of course during planing I had to check for squareness and flatness.

Planing the heel block

Check the height with the side. A thin piece of spruce is place below to simulate the top.
The pencil line is the part of the side to be trimmed to.

Trim the side

2011-10-12T10:08:00.000+08:00

After the side is bent, I still need to do 2 things:
1) Trim the profile the side to fit the top
2) Cut the excess from the ends
As the top is dropped top (elevated neck) in which the top will curved down into the sides, the side will need to be trimmed to fit the top's curvature.
Well luckily I have made a template and it's matter of copying to the side and trim fit with a block plane.
And that's what I just did.
I also copy the back doming profile the sides too.

Cutting the excess from the ends

The side fits the mould now

Attaching the mould to the solera.

Copying the template to the side

Another view

Trim the side to fit the top. Note that the side is inverted top facing up.
I.e. the left side is now facing up and held on the right mould while I plane it and vice versa

Check the fit of the side to the top.

Both side done. Now my spreader after bought it for several years is put to good use.

Bending the side

2011-10-10T14:57:00.005+08:00

After thicknessing what comes next?
Bending of course.

I laid out all the things that I needed and began to bend
1) The outside mould
2) The template
3) Heat gun
4) Bending pipe
5) Sides itself.
6) Container of water (I didn't buy a spray container so I just apply it by hand)

After checking the orientation of the sides, I began to heat up the heat gun and bending.
Starting at the marking at the waist I slowly bend the wait carefully not to crack the sides.
The good thing about heat gun is I am able to heat up both sides with the hot air.
But I also need to be careful not to stand in the path of the air.
The height is right at my groin are (If you know what I meant)

Bending sure takes lots of patience.
After the waist fits the outside mould shape, I began to bend the upper bout.
And after then the lower bout.
It takes me about 30 to 45 mins for one side.
There is some spring back but well I can correct them the next time
Meanwhile I just clamp them to the outside mould and let it cool down.

All things set

Heating up the waist area

Start bending (with 2 hand of course)

The bending takes shape

Checking the bend at the waist

Bending and checking the upper bout

LB almost done. It can be squeeze into the mould.

Clamping to the mould while it cools

I touched up the previous bend to make it more fitting.
This time round I did better with a wooden block to aid the bending as advised by Alex.
After about 10 minutes it's done.
And I don't really need much clamping to the mould.

Then I started the other side starting at the waist.
The wooden block really helps: firstly to prevent my hand from being scorched;
it also prevents the cracks at the waist.
The other side has a bit of crack but none too serious.
This one is perfect.
Finally after 1/2 hour, I am done.
Much faster than yesterday.

Touch up the curves

Now I don't need to force them much into the mould

Bend the other side start with the waist. Checking the curvature at the waist

Lower bout still a lot more to go

Wet the sides with water to aid bending. Just a little will do not to soak them.

The right side almost done. Just a little spring back at the outer edge.

Clamp to the mould to cool.

Both sides done.

Thicknessing the side

2011-10-04T09:46:00.006+08:00

What's next? It will be doing up the sides.
Of course I haven't carved the peghead yet but I am waiting to purchase a good set of forstener drill bit.
The ones I had wasn't sharp enough and I don't want to ruin a good neck.

So I began to thickness the sides.
At first I tried my regular block plane, it can't cut w/o a tearout...
So I had to use my MJF high angle block instead.
It works great but a bit slow.
The thickness was about 2.8mm region
After some work I only managed to bring it down to 2.5mm
I am targeting at 2mm for easier bending.

The sides

Planing using my MJF HA block

Thicknessing in action.

Thicknessing the side is sure hard work especially with a block plane that is so small.
In the end I tried to tune the #4 making it having finer cut and even the blade.
It works just fine.
Luckily previously I have already tune the sole of the plane and mouth as tight as possible.
The plane iron is Lee Valley A2 and has been sharpened recently.
The tearout is minimal; nothing that can't be sand away.
Well in woodworking, the importance of having sharp tools cannot be overlooked.
I thickness one of the sides to 2.0mm ready for bending.
Now have to work on the other side.

Planing with the #4.

Thickness 2mm just nice.

I have completed thicknessing the 2 sides.
After some rough sanding I am ready to bend them.

I trace the back curvature from my existing Gutmeier guitar which probably was shaped using a radius dish. (Well it looks like it)
And when I cut out the template, the it's pretty much the same except that it start to slope in at the waist portion.
Anyway this is just a rough guide.
I measure the excess and cut the excess as a binding.
I probably can get about 3 binding from the excess.
After that I mark out the position of the UB, W, LB and End.
Now I am all set to bend it.

The template

Cutting the binding.

Binding cut

Marking out the UpperBout Waist LowerBout and End position

Gluing the traverse brace

2011-10-03T14:52:00.009+08:00

What's next?
Of course will be gluing of the UTB and LTB.
Once that's done, the top will be consider done for now.

I just shape up the UTB and LTB a bit more and proceed to gluing.
Due to the slope at the upper bout, I had to increase the height of the go-bar deck.
But the increase wasn't really enough, I had to bend the go-bar quite a bit.

At first when I apply the go-bar the LTB went out of vertical plane.
Luckily I remember to apply it in the same plane as the strut i.e. across the top and everything went smoothly.
As a precaution I apply 2 more go-bar to keep the UTB and LTB press into the donut.

Ready for gluing

Apply the HHG

Gluing it down

Applying the go-bar

Gluing the UTB

Apply the go-bar

Side view make sure they are glued down vertically to the top plane.

Another view. The 2 go-bar in front is to ensure the UTB pop against the donut.

Another view

What's next? That will be carving the LTB and UTB.
I simply use the small violin making plane to do the carving.
They worked great.

After releasing from the go-bar deck

Carving the profile of the traverse brace

Sanding them smooth.

The finished top.

End view

Oblique angle

Side view

Front oblique view

The final top weighs about 189.2g.
Well I thought the carving of the brace will reduce it further but it's ok.
It already reached my target of under 200g.
When I further trim the sides of the TB and the perimeter of the top, it probably will be in the range of 187g.

189.2g

Here is some taptone of the top.
The first is tapping at the bridge region.
2nd clip is tapping at the waist region: where the LTB's open aperture is.
and then at the junction at the outer fan brace and the closing brace.
then followed by some random hits all around.

Bridge area
Waist & LB

Final weight after trimming the ends of the UTB and LTB: 187.2
Not bad.

Final weight of top 187.2

Carving the fan brace

2011-09-30T10:35:00.003+08:00

Well this is consider the most enjoyable part of the guitar building other than stringing it up and play it.
I managed to carved the fan brace using little planes which I bought for violin making.
The planes are Ibex plane copy but made in China.

First I reduce the brace height to 3mm and then shape the cross-section profile to be rounded.
Finally I use chisel to smoothen the lengthwise profile to taper to 1mm at the ends.
The tapering starts just aftert the bridge and for the front part is just a short taper (maybe about 20 mm)

Here is the pics.

Removing the go-bars

Carving using the mini planes

Measuring the height of the braces

Removing bulk of the height using the bigger plane

All braces height done. Can see the doming quite clearly

Chiseling the sides of the brace to be rounded.
I just sharpen the chisel so it's very easy

Chiseling the end taper

Can see the lengthwise profile of the braces.

The mini planes close up

I taper the outer edges of the donut

The fan braces carved.

Next I cut the closing braces to size and glue them in.
Following that I glue the side braces but that's where I made a stupid blunder...
Originally I had the idea that I should use thin tall brace for the treble side and fat wide braces for the bass side.
But I mixed them up and the fat brace ended up at the treble side...
No choice but to go with this flow...

Gluing in the closing brace.

Gluing in the side braces
Can see the taper in the donut. Looks quite nice to me

Next I began to saw the apertures in the harmonic brace.
I decided to leave the harmonic brace at 23mm tall but with a larger opening instead.
Also the profile of the parts which will be glue onto the top will not the straight, this is to reduce the stress on the grain lines.
In the middle part which is glued next to the donut, I try to extend the curve of the donut into the harmonic brace.
After all is cut, I shape the brace into a smooth curves.

Drilling the hole in the lower harmonic brace or Lower Traverse Brace(LTB) and cut using a coping saw

The bottom profile of the LTB.

Checking out how the curves looked.

From the other side.

After the glued dried for I began to carved the closing brace and the side braces.
And after that worked on the UTB
The top weight is now 190g within my target
Well if possible I would like to down further maybe in the region of 175g
But so far the tap tone sound good.
A bassy ring with good sustain.

Ready to be carved

Down the height of the closing brace

Height done

3mm max for the closing brace.

The braces all carved! Looks nice to me.

Carving the UTB. Drill the holes first.

Use coping saw to saw the aperture

Chisel them straight followed by file

Done

Top weight is now 190g within my target :)

Gluing the fan struts

2011-09-28T15:20:00.002+08:00

After preparing for so long, I finally glued on the fan struts and the soundhole reinforcement donut.
I heat up the HHG and on the dehumidifier and prepare to glue.
Before gluing I had a final check on the struts length and trim accordingly with a chisel.

Once ready I position the top and hold it down with 2 go-bar one at the waist and the other at the bridge region.
I apply the glue to the donut and glue on the top.
First I use 4 go-bar to glue the donut; this so that I can see the alignment of the donut.
If I use the wood straight away I can't see if it's aligned properly or not.
After it stablised, I switch to using the center screw and a wood to screw it down.
But after gluing the outer most fan brace, the block of wood was blocking it so I switch to a smaller piece of wood from my previous solera.

To glue on the fan struts, I first clamp in place a steel rule to guide fan strut to prevent it from skidding around.
I started with the center struts and work outwards. 1 2L 2R 3L 4L 3R 4R
Actually using go-bar isn't as easy as I thought it would be.
The go-bar has to slide from the same plane as the fan strut direction so prevent the strut from skidding around.

Here are the pics:

Final check of the struts length.

Securing the top in place

Applying HHG to the donut

Gluing on the donut.

Securing the steel rule

Gluing the center strut

2nd strut

The wood blocking the 4th strut outermost fan strut

Change to a smaller wood strip to secure the donut

All done

Side view

Close up view can see the doming quite clearly.

Zoom in the donut region

Can see my HHG by the side :)

Next to come carving of the struts...

Making the go-bar deck

2011-09-27T10:17:00.001+08:00

In order to glue the struts, I need to make the go-bar deck.
I was thinking to attach the top deck to the solera, which I will be making using 2 pieces of 1cm thick plywood.
This probably won't be strong enough and so I added a cross-bracing to the top.
I started making the notches in the bracing and it's a good way to improved my chiseling skill.
Now I am pretty confident of making a normal dado or mortise-tenon by chisel.
Not perfect fit but acceptable.
I realised the crucial part is that the chisel must be real sharp.
The rest is just getting them to fit.

Gluing 2 pieces of plywood together

Sawing the edges straight. After that I followed up by chiseling and planing to make the 2 pieces flushed.

Chiseling the notch

Cleaning the notch to make them fit.

Notch done

Gluing the x-brace down.
The middle part I use another scrap to press down.
I don't have any clamp that is that long reach.

X-brace done. The X-brace will help to keep the plywood flat too.

After that I drilled the holes for the top and bottom board.
I've decided not to attached the top board to the solera.
This makes it easier for me to use the deck for back struts too.
Due to the position of the X-brace I could not drill exactly at the corners but I have to drilled to fit the 2 boards.

I assembled the board with 3 legs, for the last leg the hole had some chipped pieces
I glued them back.
With just 3 legs, the assembly is kind of wobbly...
I wonder would it be able to withstand the pressure of the go-bars?
The last time I use the Aluminium go-bars on the table the entire table rose up...
I had put books and other heavy weight to weigh it down.
Well if the threaded rod doesn't work then I have to build using wood legs.

Drilling the hole 10mm to allow the threaded rods to go thru'

Assembly.

The parts

Go-bar deck assembled

Another view

Testing the deck. Test run of the gluing process and adjusting the height of the deck to exert enough pressure and the go-bars are not too curved.

Close up of the doming of the struts

I have made some more go-bars for the gluing.
4 for each struts 7x4 = 28 and 2 extra.
That should be enough to start the gluing process.

Next commision

2011-09-23T10:49:00.003+08:00

Well my next commission is a Pink Ivory B/S Lutz Spruce top.
I made some measurement of the density of this Lutz top and it's about 370 kg/m3.
This is light and good stuff.
According to my luthier friend Alexandru Marian, the spruce is the same log as the master grade Lutz that he have.
The only reason why it was downgrade was the presence of knots but for the FE 17 build, the knots are out of the plantilla :)
I love stuffs that are good quality but at a bargained price.

I learned more about the back and side wood: Pink Ivory from an experienced steel string guitar luthier at the OLF
John Mayes.
He is very kind to share with me the critical points of dealing with the Pink Ivory.
According to him, Pink Ivory bends like Maple (very easily), just need to spritz it and bend it.
Looks like I am in luck that Pink Ivory is not a hard wood to bend!

The plantilla is a FE17 the Torres guitar, which was used by the famous guitarist Francisco Tárrega.
The original FE17 is using a flamed maple as the B/S but this time round I will be using a beautiful set of Pink Ivory.
Scale length is 640mm.
I haven't decided if I want to include the tornavoz inside.
Maybe as a parallel build, I will make the original maple B/S FE17.
One thing though, I won't be making the elevated fingerboard in this build as the body size of the guitar is very small if the elevated fingerboard is included the internal volume will be affected.
As it is the geometry of the elevated fingerboard is very complicated, if I want to include the tornavoz... it will be too complicated.
Anyway that's for further review when I build the solera for the FE17.

Here is some teaser pics:

Pink Ivory B/S

Lutz Spruce top

Sawing the braces

2011-09-08T23:57:00.004+08:00

Well I am not exactly done on the neck but for now that will suffice.
I proceed on to making the braces from the blank.

A good question now arises: saw or split?
Splitting brace from the blank isn't exactly easy.
I try to split one from an Englemann spruce blank but Englemann spruce are very prone to twisting (run out) so I didn't get anything usable from the splitting.
So instead I saw the braces from the blank and let the saw follow the natural saw line.
So I did get bigger on one end and smaller on the other but that's alright I can plane them flat.
I colored the ends to see the grains better.
After planing I got all my braces
Following that I began to size them accordingly for the 7 fan braces, 2 traverse brace and 2 closing brace and the side braces beside the sound hole.
I had to square the end and use the shooting board method to square them.
I use the aluminium bar as a stopper.
Quite accidently I actually plane the aluminium bar.
The A2 plane iron is definitely harder than the Al bar.

Here are the pictures.

Sawing the brace from blank

Planing them accordingly to the grain line

I colored the ends to see the grain orientation more clearly.

Here's one that need lots of squaring to the grain orientation.

The planing setup. Al bars as stoppers

Width of 7mm

The bracing layout

The bracing layout after I marked the layout on the template and transfer to the top.

I need to trim the braces.
I weigh the top and all the braces it's a hefty 300+ g...
Typical traditional fan bracing top should be under 200g probably close to 185g to 190g.
A classical double (composite nomex) top weighs about 120 or so.

Next to come will be the gluing of the braces watch out for it.
But before that I need to build my go-bar deck.

I cut the braces to size and lay them out on the top.
Also I trim down the height to about 5 to 6 mm 1st.
More will be trim to the final height of 3 mm
Also I cut the donut soundhole reinforcement to size.
I was deciding on along grain or across grain orientation but decide to follow my previous across grain.
I weigh them the whole top is about in the 220 region.
More weight to removed considering I have not cut the harmonic bar to size and trim down the braces.
But I have not add the 2 support braces beside the soundhole yet.

Cutting the donut soundhole reinforcement

Sawing the braces to length

Layout on the top.

Trim braces to height

Trimming the donut

Weighing the top 228g more shaving to be done

The layout ready to be glued

Gluing the headplate / Making neck

2011-09-02T23:12:00.005+08:00

I also glue up the headplate for the neck.
It was pretty easy with no fuss.
I just apply the HHG to the veneer one by one, and finally paste on the IRW (from back) on the veneer.
The only thing is have to work fast with the HHG, so I didn't have time to take more pictures.

But I did use up my batch of HHG and had to remix the glue.
I didn't weigh the HHG but instead remember the viscosity of the fluid when I mixed it.

Applying HHG

More HHG

Gluing the Headplate

Clamping it

Mixing HHG

Checking the crystal dissolving in the hot water

There was some gaps so I apply more HHG and clamp tighter

Gaps closed and the excess headplate / veneer leveled.

Planing the excess veneer/headplate

Leveled

Next is to cut the excess part from the end of the headplate so that it can support the nut.
Because the head is at an angle (15 deg) to the neck, we need to make the slot vertically down perpendicular to the neck.
So I plane a support block using the head and shooting board method.
I put some scrap wood to protect the neck.

Finally when it's down I use my ryoba saw and started sawing the protruding headplate and veneer.
Finally I clean up with a chisel and sanding block
Looks good.

Marking the starting of the nut.

Marking using white color pencil

Shoot / Plane the support block to correct angle

Aligning the support block to the line drawn.

Starting sawing. (pic is abit blur)

Sawing the headplate 1/2 way

Sawing the veneer

Cut and clean up with chisel and sandpaper.

Next I proceed on with the neck making.
I measure the 12 fret marking with 5mm for the nut and 325mm for the 12 fret mark.
This is a 650 (1/2 of it is 325) scale length guitar.

Marking the 12 fret

12 fret mark 325mm from nut space

Nut allowance 5mm

Then I add another 125mm for the elevated neck and cut off the excess
I use another neck blank for the stack heel.
I square shoot the end grain of the cut blocks.
and prepare the block for gluing.

Cutting the excess

Cut!

All blocks cut

Aligning the blocks

Drawing the 12 fret line and curve of the heel

I proceed to cut the slope on the neck for the elevated neck part.
After removing my sawing, I plane the rest of the neck to be almost flush with the solera.
A bit of fitting more to go.

Cutting the slot with a block (hidden) as a guide.

Sawing the excess part.

The slope sawn.

Planing using a shoulder plane so that I can reach all the way into the edge.

Close up view.

The main bulk is done using block plane

Almost done. You can see the pencil line there is some more allowance to go for fitting.

To fit into the solera I need to cut the wings of the elevated part of the neck.
Conventional fingerboard is < 65mm (62mm at the 12th fret) for this part I set width at 69mm for some allowance.I also have to cut the protruding part of the solera at the 12th fret.After cutting and fitting into the solera I check the slope of the elevated fingerboard part.My blank was definitely higher: So I have a choice of lowering it to fit the solera or add another part into the solera.I am tending toward the latter as I think a higher elevated fingerboard would be easier to play.Point to consider is also the slope of the doming of the topboard that will be forced by the elevated fingerboard.

Sawing the wings off. I have to becareful as sawing along grain can easily cause splitting.
As a safeguard I cut the crossgrain cut at the 12 fret to prevent over splitting in case it happens

Done

Trimming ends at 12th fret

Trimming the width with chisel

Cutting the solera at the 12th fret

Fitted neck into the solera

Now the dilemma: fit the solera to the neck or neck to solera?

Well I solve the dilema, just raise the solera.
I feel that a too low raise fingerboard would not be effective (might as well do without).
My current neck blank's angle and height is just nice.
So I would rather the solera fit the neck blank.

Anyway I use a scrap piece of wood mark the excess angle and plane it down.
Next I glue it to the solera.
After that I glue the heel block.
The slots would need to be cut before I glue the heel block to the neck.

Planing the addition piece of wood

Gluing it to the solera

Preparing to glue the heel block

Glued. With HHG I don't have much to time to take the in between pics

As a treat this is roughly how the elevated neck will look like.

After removing the clamps

I level the additional 2 blocks to fit the neck blank.

With the heel block

Next to cut the slots in the heel block

For that I will be using my neck jig that will have a angle in the slot as defined by the jig.
The side do not join the heel block in a 90 degree but at a slight angle probably around 89 or 88 degree

I square the heel block roughly and marked out the center lines of the block.
This will be align to the neck later on.
The center line is also required for symmetry purposes.

I discover that it's impossible to clamp the heel block.
So I need to glue a scrap piece of wood to the heel block in order to cut the slots.
I glued it with 4 drops of PVA white glue; just enough to hold the block and need to remove the scrap after that.
In a normal neck I just clamp to the neck part but in this elevated fingerboard neck, I cut the heel block separately from the neck.
This cause the problem of not enough places to clamp the heel block.
The next time I can cut bottom most piece longer enough for me to clamp the heel block.
After sawing the slots I can cut the excess away for another heel block.

Squaring the heel block

Gluing a scrap piece to the wood for clamping purpose

After that I began to mark the slot.
The jig has a proble: it was not square...
I had to put a wedge to correct the angle.
Then I began sawing.
I didn't have a physical stop for me to stop sawing but use my eyes to check the sawing mark.
Once I hit the mark I will stop sawing.
Once completed I realised the angle for both sides isn't the same...
That is the problem of a poorly made jig... Think I need to rework on it.
Anyway I began sawing the back slot with a slight taper for the wedging effect.
And chisel out the in between.

Ready to saw the slot.

Marking on the heel block

Sawing the slot

Another view.

The heel block slot sawn, note the slight taper for the wedging effect of the 2nd slot?

The angle for the 2 sides isn't symmetrical need to correct that later.

Chiseling the slot

Sawing the back of the heel block

Planing it level.

Heel block with the neck.

With the top in place. Note the wedge for the top to wedge the top in between the neck.

Another view

Close up.

Installing the fingerboard marker

2011-09-01T10:01:00.000+08:00

I install the fingerboard marker on my guitar #1.
The process was quite simple.
I drill the hole of the right size, apply some PVA glue and glue the MOP marker,
and finally file it level.

Drilling the hole of the right size.

The hole drilled

Glue the MOP in and level it.

Thicknessing the top

2011-08-26T10:01:00.003+08:00

I began to thickness the top.
The bridge area was about 2.5 mm the perimeter was about 2.2 to 2.3 mm.
For the upper bout I leave it thick at close to 3 mm.
I need to leave some thickness for final sanding.
Hmm maybe I should do a thickness mapping for reference.

Thicknessing using block plane.

Bridge area thickness about 2.5 mm

Outer perimeter about 2.2 mm

Sanding away the plane marks.

I also weigh the current weight of the top; it's about 141.3g a bit on the heavy side I think.

Weight 141.3g

I layed the top on the solera to check out the dimension and doming.
Seems ok.

Top on my new solera

The elevated neck portion

The doming part

I thin the upper bout to a max thickness of 2.5 mm and re-weigh the top it came about 133.3g.
Now with the bracing it should fall between 175 to 180g?
I better cut the bracing and weigh the total weight before gluing.

Top weight after thinning the upper bout to 2.5mm.

Cutting the sound hole on the top

2011-08-26T09:48:00.002+08:00

I use the same cutter and cut out the soundhole.
I set the size at 82 mm diameter and cut one side and turn over and cut the other side.

After that I insert the spruce patch to cover the part of the rosette channel that was not inlayed.

Cutting on one side

Turn over and cut with the same radius

Top view

Done

Cleaning up the section; chisel away the excess purfling lines.

Test fit the patch

Glue the patch

Leveling it

Done

The completed top.

Nomex and Redwood top

2011-08-24T14:18:00.001+08:00

I bought some more stuff from LMI.
This time round: a nomex and red wood top.
Well sometime in the future I am going to try making the double top (composite top)

Here are the pics

Nomex: it's very light

Close up of the nomex. You can see the honeycomb structure.

Red top below WRC on top.

Inlay the rosette

2011-08-24T10:29:00.002+08:00

I began to inlay the rosette.
The steps are quite simple but it's always daunting to do something that intricate.
I had to take precautions for protecting the top from accidental dings.

The video which I watch from Robbie O'Brien's online lesson is very helpful in this respect.
The video describes all the minute but important details of doing the rosette inlay.
I simply followed the steps in that video in inlaying the rosette.

First of all, I drill the center hole for on the top onto the board.
Make sure there are no debris on the board that will damage the top.

Drill the center hole

Then I measure the rosette inner diameter and divide it by 2 to get the radius.
Note that we are dealing with radius when we set the circular routing jig.
So the diameter value must be divided by 2 if not we get a double size rosette channel...

Measure the inner diameter

Set the circular jig. Remember length is the diameter divided by 2.
Also it is measured from center of pin to router bit edge nearer to the pin.

Then I set measure it and set the circular jig just inside of the radius.
I test cut the jig make sure the depth is correct at the top of the board where the fret board will cover the top, so that any mistakes will not be seen.
The depth I have set was too deep 1.5mm initially and so I set to 1mm instead.

Test cut at the top part of the top.

Check the rosette fit.

Following that I started routing the the inner circle.
And repeat the same for the outer circle.
Note the measurement on the jig for inner arc is from center of pin to the edge of the router bit closer to the pin.
For outer arc, the measure is from center of the pin to the outer edge (away from the pin) of the router bit.

Inner arc done

Measure the outer diameter (divide / 2 to get the radius)

Test cut for outer arc

Outer arc done.

Then I route in between the outer and inner arc and remove the rest of the material using my sharpened chisel.

Route the in between.

Removing the waste by chisel

The chisel must be sharpened to get optimal results.

After that I check the fit for the rosette.
I have cut a bit too small but that's alright since I can always enlarged the channel but I can't reduce the channel.
So after enlarging the channel I check the fit for the rosette.
It was a snug fit.
The only mistake which I made was to cut the circular jig in a circular manner.
I should have cut from top to left and right side and from bottom to left and right side.
This will prevent the chip out.
Nonetheless that's OK, I have to inlay the borders with purfling too.
(That's one way to save the rosette if you make the channel slightly too wide: inlay thicker purfling to cover the extra space.)

Check for fit

I use HHG again for the gluing of the rosette.
I apply the glue and push the rosette into the channel and put a wax paper on top and some weights on top of the rosette.
But after that I decide to clamp it down instead with clamps.

Preparing to glue the rosette

Applying the glue to the channel

Pressing in the rosette into the channel

Wax paper on the rosette and board on top.

Weights to weigh down the rosette

But change to use clamp instead.

After some time I started to level the rosette with my block planes.
I use 2 block planes the LA Stanley sweetheart block plane and my MJF HA block plane.
The HA block is very effective in reducing tear-out.
But I had to sharpen the blade before I use it.

Finally after an hour of work I manage to level the rosette.

My LA block

HA block

Always remember to clear the debris regularly to protect the top.
Also I have used a vanguard sheet to protect the lower bout.

At various stage of lowering the rosette

Finally leveled.

The debris

Rosette done. (Back lit)

Can see the jagged edge on the 1st and 3rd quadrant of the circle.
That's due to cutting into the grain.
Well when I route the channel for the purfling I must remember to go along the grain.

After successfully inlay the main rosette, I began to route the channel for the surrounding purfling.
This time round I remember to go in along the grain and not against the grain.
I.e. From top to 2 sides and from bottom to 2 sides and finally one pass whole round to smooth-en out any kinks.

Next to come how to inlay and glue the purfling.

Preparing to route the purfling channel. Again I start from the top.

From top to side.

Channel done. No jagged edges this time round :)

Red and white border I am thinking to add a black in between

Or alternate purfling?

Finally decide on this scheme.
I enlarged the channel to accommodate this red white black white red purfling.

Applying the HHG

After it dried I started to plane away the purfling.

Looking good

Level with the rosette

Inner channel

Disaster struck...
The purfling wasn't sitting into the channel fully. (too narrow)
I had to remove the purfling widen the channel and retry.
But the purfling was soaked and bloated...

Re-glue the purfling

Close up

Some gaps...

As what I have expected the gaps are quite bad.
I tried planing it level to see the effect and it's really bad.
So i decdied to route it away and put more purfling strip
To fit the gap I use 2 red and one 1 white.
After ensure the fit, I proceed to use HHG again.

Gaps seen quite clearly

Problem is the gap is not consistent.

Preparing to route.

Bigger gaps ready for new purfling

Glued. Now to wait for it to dry and trim. Hopefully this will work out

It didn't work out. The white purfling did not sit propperly in the channel.

I had to reroute the channel but now the channel becomes 6mm wide instead of the 4mm at the outer rim.

Channel cleaned.

I had to rethink what to do with this rosette since I cant go for the symmetry path, I had to think of different but interesting concentric design for the rosette.

One way is to add MOP / Abalone piece and fill with black epoxy.
But does that look weird?

In the end I decided to make it symmetrical.
Asymmetric rosette just look weird to me.
I found the herring bone purfling just fit the extra width.
The channel was 7mm: the red white black white black sums to 3.5mm and herringbone is 3.5mm.
I use the manual cutter which gives me more control to widen the channel slightly a bit.
And use my heater gun and bending iron to prebend the herringbone.
Now the rosette is very big.
But it looks nice to me ;) (nicer than asymmetric rosette)

Bending the herring bone

Holding the purfling to shape

Similarly for the colored purfling.
The circle disc are cut to the same radius as the circle that they are supposed to be inlayed to.

Dry fitting the rosette

Applying the glue. I use PVA white glue this time round for longer work time.

Gluing in the rosette. I flood the purfling with glue so that it will seep in between the veneers.

With the outer border. The rosette looks v big now.

My manual cutter parts. Originally a winged nut is used.
But the nut got sucked up by my vacuum ... and I cant find it in the bin.
It's the same very I used to cut the purfling on my #1

Assembled version.

In action (The winged nut was still there before it got sucked up by my vaccum cleaner...)

After the glue had dry I began to trim the purfling.
The left side end was not glued down properly so I apply some glue and clamp it.
Once it had dried a bit I began to trim down completely.
The inner arc was successful.
Now I use my purfling cutter to cut and inlay the outer herringbone.
There is some chiseling to do but the cutter was very precise and fine.
Luckily I didn't use the router to route the outer arc if not the outer purfling would be destroyed.
Once the channel was ready, I applied the glue and inlay the outer herringbone.
Hope it works out fine.

Trimming the inner arc

Gluing and clamping down the left corner which wasn't glued properly.

Trimming down the excess purfling

Close up shot

Scribing the outer arc

Fully scribed the arc.

Chiseling the channel

Another view of chiseling the channel.

Dry fit of the purfling

Applying PVA white glue to the channel

Glue in

Put wax paper over the rosette

Clamp it tight and hope for the best.

After the I release the clamp the upper corner wasn't sit in the channel properly.
So with some coaxing and re-gluing and clamping it was done.
That corner won't matter much as along as it's leveled as it will be covered by the fingerboard.
After that I proceed to inlay a spruce patch (from the cutoff) to cover the top part of the rosette channel not covered by the rosette.
And then finally leveled it
Finally after so many incidents, the rosette is done.

The rosetted

Leveled!

Another angle.

Making soundhole reinforcement

2011-08-13T00:27:00.001+08:00

I use the cut-off from the top to make the sound hole reinforcement.
First of all, I need to joint the 2 pieces together.
I shoot the pieces to join using my Stanley #4.
Then I use the rule to raise the middle and then clamp the side supports, apply the glue, and place in the jig and clamp.

Leave it overnight and removed it from the board.
Unfortunately I didnt place enough wax paper and the spruce glued to the board.
I had pry it open.
There was some splitting but it's ok that part would be cut off

Next I route the outer diameter.
For the inner one I will route after I route the hole in the main top soundboard.

Shooting the spruce

Ready for clamping

I forgot to take pic of the clamping board but it's similar to what I have done previously.

Preparing to route

One side done

Flipped over and route the other side.

Reinforcement cut

On the souondhole.

Tobias Berg Guitar

2011-08-03T11:36:00.005+08:00

A guitar came into my workshop for some setup work.
It was a 2005 Spruce IRW #23 guitar.
The top was a 4 piece spruce (most likely Euro spruce) with tight grains and plenty of Medullary grain / silking.
The joint are seemless and it's so well done that it not obvious that it's 4 piece top.

Correction: after careful examination and pointed out by Alex (Marian), this is a 2-pieced spruce top.
In the upper bout there are some wavy grain line along that "joint". (In a joint, the line would be straight, so this could not have been a line.)
This is also confirmed by Tobias Berg himself as the owner, Reza asked him.
Berg said (refer to the comments section) that if it's a 4 piece joint, he would have cleated the joint at that part.
My apologies for that mistake.
This is not to discount a 4-piece joint against 2 piece joint top, so long as it's well made both are equally good sounding.
Even Torres himself made non-symmetrically joint 3 pieced or 4 pieced top.

The back joint are equally good that it looks like a one piece back.
The guitar belonged to a local talented guitarist Reza, who just had his solo recital at Esplanade Library.

Here is some picture of the guitar.

The Tobias Berg guitar in the case

See the plantilla.

See the 4-piece top joint. It's so seamlessly perfect.

12 hole bridge

Distinct headstock design

Tuning Machine

The rosette

The details in the rosette

The bracing (looks like a Torres bracing)

Top purfling

I'll do some recording once I settle the saddle.

Clamping the saddle blank for filing.

Filing the saddle

Almost there.

Testing the saddle.

I did some recording with the Berg and compared it against my guitar.
Here is the recording
Aconquija (Sengoh)
Aconquija (Berg)

El Testament d' Amelia (Sengoh)
El Testament d' Amelia (Berg)

Lagrima (Sengoh)
Lagrima (Berg)

Preambulo (Sengoh)
Preambulo (Berg)

The 2 guitars have very similar sound.
What I feel is that Berg guitar is overall more balance than mine.
Mine the bass is growling and big, and in recording Berg's guitar sound better.
But when playing live, I prefer my guitar's sound slightly more.

Here is a pic of the bracing pattern
And it's definite Torres fan bracing.

Tobias Berg's Torres Bracing pattern (closed harmonic brace)

Here's a pic of mine.

My Torres bracing (with open harmonic brace)

Jointing top

2011-07-20T10:34:00.004+08:00

I also did the jointing of my Lutz spruce top.
Having recently learnt how to read runout from a light source from Alex (Alexandru Marian an upcoming luthier, who really delved deeply into various aspects guitar making), I choose the joint face which will give less runout

Notice the light reflection graduates smoothly from L to R.
In a runout joint, you can see a side looks noticeable darker than the other side.
And when you turn another angle, the dark side light side reversed.
This is due to the grains going to different directions and thus reflect light differently from the other.

I use my #4 for shooting the jointing edge.
Ever since I fine tune my #4 and upgrade the iron, the plane was a pleasure to use.
The shavings are so fine and it's easy to do a jointing even though it's only #4.

Fine shavings from #4

Again I will look on a lighted source background to determine if the joint seam is perfect or not.
Once I am satisfied, I began to glue it using HHG.
Well since I have to act fast, I didn't have time to take pictures.

Shooting with #4 on a shooting board.

Preparing to glue

I applied the HHG to the edge, place on the jig with wax papers.
Tied in the rope, and drive in the wedge.
After gluing up I fire the dehumidifier to control the RH to 45% or so.
Well I just chuck it underneath my table workbench to better control the RH.

Joined top

I had some problem with the tear-out of of the spruce.
None of my western plane no matter how tight I adjust the plane mouth can plane the spruces properly without tear-out.
One way is to sand it level and smooth using a rough grit but that will take awfully long and it's tedious work.
So I thought of using my MJF high angle block plane and it works just right.
I manage to level the tear-out portion and sand it smooth.

Planing using my MuJingFang high angle block plane

The plane in action

Another view

The end product looks good.

My chisel collection

2011-07-20T10:02:00.000+08:00

I was maintaining my chisel, sharpening them and coating them with a thin layer of mineral oil.
I thought it will be good to take the collection of my chisels.

Here it is my chisel collection

On the left is my Buck Brothers (from Diefenbacher) firmer chisel set (1/4", 3/8", 1/2", 5/8", 3/4", 1").
Next in order of L to R
3 Irwin Marples blue chip chisel
2" Buck Bro chisel.
1" 2 Cherries bent chisel and 2mm 2 Cherries chisel (for purfling use).
On the right side top section:
1" Japanese nomi and some various shape Japanese carving tools
At the bottom right section:
Some Chinese made violin tools
PFeil skew chisel in the middle
and a Bahco gouge on the right most.
At the top are my 3 paring chisel (1", 3/8", and crank 3/8")

Making the Rosette (Again)

2011-06-27T13:00:00.011+08:00

In the last rosette attempt, the router drifted and parts of the rosette was over-cut.
I reasoned that mistake was due to the several factors:

1) The double sided tape didn't manage to hold the rosette
2) Not enough power on the Dremel (B&D RTX) rotary tool

So to deal with this issues what I can think of is
For problem 1)
- I'll glue them to a thin board or paper cardboard and route together with it.
- I'll use a 2 circular clamping caul:
I first route the inner rim. I can use the outer caul, which will have a hole cut in the middle
and will clamp up to 1/2 of the rosette width.
Similarly, when I route the outer rim, I will use the inner caul which will also clamp up to 1/2 the rosette width.
But the only problem is the I need to extend the circular jig such that the router bit can protrude beneath longer.
So either I use the laminate trimmer or make another instead of using the StewMac precision router base.

For problem 2)
I can definitely use the laminate trimmer for more power.
But more power also means more potential for disaster...

Looks like I need to do some testing out before I route the actual rosette.

I prepared the files once again and this time round I correct the angle for each tile, making sure they all converge to the center point.
Using the #4 plane and cut the tile by moving the tile instead of the plane, I can control how to remove and where.
To make the angle more acute, I swipe the front portion first and move the starting point back and eventually take a full pass.
Also I make sure that the tile sides is still perpendicular to the face.

Finally I laid them out on the cardboard.
All set to glue and route.

Checking the alignment the taper of the tiles.

Adjusting the taper of the tile on the plane

The rosette tile ready to be glue and routed.

I glued them together using hide glue this time round.
Well I haven't decided if I wanted to glue them or double taped them to a backing while routing.
So meanwhile I just glued the tiles together on a wax paper and then hold them together using fingers while the HHG gels.

Finally I glued them into a arc; ready for the next step
1) Should I glue them onto a thin plywood backing?
But how do I remove the backing after I routed the rosette?
Sand them till nothing?

2) Or should I just double taped them?
Will it run again while I route them? (But I will be using the trimmer this time round instead of the RTX (Dremel)
Should I build a heavier circular clamp (inner and outer)?

3) Or a hybrid? Just a drop of HHG on some of the tiles while I route and double tape the rest.
That will leave me pondering for the next few days.

Applying the HHG to the side of the tiles

Gluing them on the wax paper and holding them by finger while the HHG gels

Gluing the tiles in groups of 3s. Make sure the tiles are still within the arc

All tiles glued

Ready for routing

Well finally I thought of something I'll adopt the 2 double tape them but with an extra reinforcement.
A thin ring which I cut from a plywood that is screw down onto the board and thus clamping the rosette tiles.
When I route the inner arc, the outer part of the rosette will be clamped down.
Conversely when I route the outer arc, the inner part will be clamped down.
Together with the double tape I think it will hold just fine.
I tried to move the rosette without even being double tape, the clamp is sure tight.

I routed the inner and outer ring for the rosette as reference on the board.

The outer and inner clamp which I made from plywood.
I just routed somewhere in the middle and I get 2 clamps

The inner clamp

Drill the screw holes and counter sink them.

The clamp in action.

Elevate the base as the screw protrudes below.
I lazy to cut to length the screws; anyway the nuts will protrude also.

Now to make the outer clamp
Similarly I just drill and countersunk the holes.
And I tried to clamp the rosette blank: holds very tight.
Now I am all set to start routing the rosette.

I will first route the outer ring and use the inner circle clamp.
After aligning the rosette in the 2 ring marking I routed onto the board,
I started to screw tight the middle clamp.
Then I just started to route a shallow pass and check the effect.
Looks good and I tried a 2 more pass to finally clear the outer circle.

Before I loosen the central clamp I started to clamp the outer clamp.
This way I wont loose the position of the rosette, and the 2 arcs will be concentric.
After clamping, I started to route the inner circle.
The effect wasn't too good and I adjust the length inwards into the rosette and cut until I get a clean arc.
The final effect was very good.
I am pleased with myself the clamp works perfectly.

Outer clamp

Ready to route

Another view

Route the outer arc 1st pass

Close up looks good.

Outer arc done

Close up looks clean

Clamping the outer clamp w/o releasing the inner - to ensure the alignment is correct

Inner clamp removed

Ready to route inner arc

1st pass. Clamping looks sturdy.

Final pass done

Not even edges. Need to adjust further in and route again

Close up

Re-routed. Finally done.

Debris cleared.

Measure against the cardboard reference

Against wood background looks good.

On the top

Next to come inlay it.

I am deciding what border to use for the rosette:
1) Red white black (thick) purfling or
2) Red white herringbone(thick) style
Main consideration is that I want to make the edge purfling style same as the rosette.
I only have 2 pieces of herring bone left and 2 cutoff left behind from my 1st build.
This might not be enough.

Trying out the purlfing scheme for the rosette

On a white background.

The other purfling scheme which I thought is simpler.
The herringbone doesn't really fit.

Then I proceed to cut some purfling from my fibre veneer sheet.
I use a penknife and clamp a 1metre steel rule on the veneer sheet.
The thin veneer sheet is easy to cut but for the black thick fibre sheet, it was too thick.
I tried using the B&D RTX with a diamond cutter disk but the RTX grew too hot.
In the end, I just use a fret saw and saw it successfully.
Sometimes simple tools work best.

Cutting the purfling.

Sawing the Top outline

2011-06-04T16:17:00.001+08:00

Well my workbench table isn't exactly cleared of the things,
but I just couldn't resist it so I took out the top and saw the outline.
I leave about 5mm of border from the plantilla line.

Cutting the top was much easier as the top was softer than the back.
I had a better fret saw and that certainly does make a difference.
The fret saw grip the blade more tightly and I didn't manage to break any blade this time round.

Here are the pictures.

The tops nearly all saw.

The top

Top and back

I also measure the thickness using my caliper and it was about 2.8 mm throughout.
That was close to the final thickness.
I had better start to inlay the rosette and carry on my work.
Hopefully by the end of the year I should be done.

New Zoot Collection

2011-05-11T19:46:00.005+08:00

I have ordered some new woods from Prosono International.
2 sets of Pink Ivory
1 set of Mopane
1 set of African Blackwood
What can I say, they are beautiful

I also order a Black Limba set from a fellow luthier @ the OLF

Update: I probably can resume work next month.
The house upgrade / renovation is done.
But I still need to paint the walls and ceiling, the walls are done and now left with the ceiling. Yeah!

Here are the pics:

The package arrived

The four set of woods, stickered nicely

Pink Ivory (3 piece back)

Pink Ivory (using 2 large piece of the 2 sets)

Pink ivory set 2

Mopane (master grade)

African blackwood, 4 piece back but I only use 3 of the 4 piece piece with a Torres FE19 plantilla

They actually use ABW cut-offs to sticker the wood!

Close up of the sticker woods

Black Limba

My Lutz spruce (Picea Lutzii) from Shane of High Mountain Tonewoods also arrived in this month.
Well they aren't the best grade, like my previous batch of Lutz spruce (AA) but the quality is equivalent.
Tonewood grading are actually is misnomer; it is graded from it's appearance rather than it's quality.
So a master grade tonewood just simply means it looks great; it has no direct bearing on whether it's a great / excellent / lousy tonewood.
However usually those graded in AA and above are quartered-sawn as opposed to those in the A grade and below.

Anyway this batch of spruce is graded A, it's well quartered and supposedly to be in the AAA grade or AA grade but it was downgraded due to it's cosmetic flaws.
There are knots and sometimes in the center of the tonewood.
Most of the sets (13 tops) I can do a 2 piece tops with the knots moved to the outer sides.
But some of them the knots are right in the middle.
So I can do a 4-piece tops or maybe mixed it with WRC?

Here are some pics of the spruce.